Laser assemblies include several components which require precise alignment therebetween for effective operation thereof. When lasers are used in industrial applications, they must be periodically maintained which requires disassembly of selected components thereof, repair or replacement as required, and then reassembly of the components. The reassembly process requires precise alignment of the components for obtaining effective operation of the laser. Accordingly, the laser is unusable during the down-time required for its maintenance which has a negative financial affect.
Two exemplary commercial lasers include rod lasers or face-pumped slab lasers. The face-pumped slab lasers are relatively more complex and require cooling of the components thereof for effective operation and, therefore, the reconditioning thereof is a more complex and lengthy process than that associated with the simpler rod lasers.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,278,860, assigned to the present assignee, a modular construction for a face-pumped laser head is disclosed which utilizes a fixturing jig assembly for constructing a modular face-pumped slab laser head. And, another positioning, compression, and storage device is utilized for temporarily holding together the slab head components. It is desirable to eliminate the jig assembly and the storage device for obtaining an improved modular face-pumped laser head assembly having less complexity and reduced down-time during maintenance.
The modular face-pumped lasers identified above in the Cross-Reference Section and in the above identified patent have particular utility with conventional arc-lamp or flash-lamp optical pumping of the laser slabs therein. However, diode laser arrays are undergoing development for use in pumping laser slabs and require a suitable configuration for effectively pumping the slab while maintaining uniform slab cooling. It is also desirable to eliminate the need for the assembly jig and the storage device addressed above while maintaining effective alignment of the components with preferably modular construction for allowing ready disassembly and assembly of the components during a maintenance outage.